>> this is "bbc world news eserica." funding of this tation is made possible by the freeman foundation, and koer foundation, pursuing solutions for america's neglected needs. >> plannina vacation escape that is relaxing, inviting, and exciting is a lot easier than you think. you can find it here in aruba. riendses, couples, and can all find their escape on the island with warm, sunny days, cooling trade winds, and the crystal blue caribbean sea. nonstop flights are available

from most major airports. more information for your vacation planning is available at aruba.com. >> and now, "bbc world news." jane: this is "bbc world news america." reporting from washington, i am jane 'brien. they say there is no chaos, but the white house is f another major departure, while a porn star sues the president. u.k. pice say a nerve agent was the weapon used in an attempt to murder a former russian spy d his daughter. i am so glad i have had a bad day at work. and i try out the unsettling new sport of axe throwing. the trend started in canada. now the u.s. is taking aim.

jane: welcome to our viewers on public television in america and around the world. the departure lounge at the white house is a busy place these days, and now president isump's top economic a gary cohn is the latest is that -- to say he is leaving. mr. cohn was publicly opposed to the president's plan to introduce tariffs on steel and aluminum imports. his resignation comes just a week after white house communications director hope hicks announced she was leaving. the white house press secretary was asked about the high turnover at today's briefing. ms. sanders: this is an intense place as is every white house, and it is not abnormal that you have people come and go, but we are continuing to do great work and focus on the president's agenda and that is what we are all here to do. jane: for more on the latest of

departure, i was joined a short time ago by reid wilson of "the hill." sarah sanders says there is nothing abnormal about this, but i've never seen anything like this. have you? reid: there's nothing abnormal about people leavinghe white house. there is something very abnormal about so many high-level people leaving in the space of the year. the white house is a pressure filled p administration has some churn and burn, and people do a couple yrs and they leave or they, back. everybody needs a break from the pressure. but the fact is there is so much pressure on this white house vethat they ad a turnover rate unprecedented in modern history. by the way, the president has excluded so many typical republicans from his administration because they have been critical of him that it is not entirely clear that there are aaft of bodies waiting to fill these vacant positions at the level of quality necessary to run the white house. jane: what do these ures actually have in common and what do they say about the state of e white house?

reid: they say the white house is a tumultus place right now. there's a tremendous strain being put on them by the special counsel investigation, as well is the massive challenge of running a huge federal bureaucracy, being run by people who have never been inside before. it is a huge challenge to get your hands around that. a lot of people who have left are the people who have not won fights, likel gary cohn over the steel tariffs, or people who have come under scrutiny for doing things like lying to the fbi, which michael flynn, the first national security adviser -- he was out within the firstonth. jane: the president's personal inner circle is shrinking as well. gary cohn was arguably one of the highest-profile s to go. how much of a gap will he leave? id: he leaves a gap for republicans looking for somebody who agrees with their economic message. republicans on capitol hill have a much different view of what

ought toappen economically, especially on things like tde, than president trump does. they do not agree with the president's stand on these tariffs. they just lost a big ally at the white house, an avoed freead . jane: as if that is not enough chaos, we're now hearing that porn star stormy daniels isin to court over her alleged affair with the president. how damaging could this be? reid: i'm not certain it couldda be thaging, given the sheer volume of attention focused on the white house and the president and the constant controversy, the constant churn of news stories. by this time tomorrow, we going to be talking about this, or are we going to be talking about the next scandal or controversy he s ginned up through 140-character tweet? jane: and that was reid wilson. disagreementcohn's with the president over tariffs,

one lawmaker who supports the move is demoatic congresswoman marcy kaptur, a representative from ohio, where the steel industry is significant. i spoke to her a short time ago from capitol hill. congresswoman, thank joining me. we have heard so much opposition to t theiffs both within the u.s. and around the world. why do you support them? rep. kaptur: first, i think the way it was announced was too broad and not specific, creating a lot of unnecessary upheaval. believe a targeted tariff approach is necessary because there are offenders in our worl that hedatory practices in the way they handle the steed production atribution. for example, my region has several steel and aluminum companies that have been battered by dumped steel from russia, china, vietnd many other countries have closed ma.ets as well, such as jap the united states has become a dump market in many ways f global steel

there comea point where you cannot lose anymore. jane: but there is every indication that this could start a massive global trade war. is it worth it for benefiting a smaller number of people? rep. kaptur: well, that is a lot of the headlines have been. e opponents to this talk about trade wars and it is all going to be so horrible. well, the details have not been released of the administration's proposal. r biggest trading partner in north america is canada. we have a very good relationship. our steel and automotive industries are integrated in a very good way. they are not the ones producing too much steel. but china is. russia is diverting their steel to get into markets in unfair ways. we have predatory practices where there is targeting by some political opponents like russia. we have to deal with that. jane: congresswoman,

politically, how do you square eupport for something president is proposing with your more general opposition to h? rep. kaptur: well, actually, he is agreeing with me in my 25-year battle to get more attention to america's trade account. have not had balanced trade accounts, half $1 trillion in the red for a quarter-century. we have lost thousan thousands and thousands of jobs. we have had production platforms shut down in many major industries, including the i represen we have confronted closed market my view -- i wish the world had moved this way in the 1990's -- isor the democracies of the d woat operate by rule of law to have a common market and to invite in other nations that may not behave in that way into the market and in so doing lt up their standards and lift up their rule of law and lift up their trade regulations.

i think the whole trade regimen globally needs to be reformed, and i think one of our bestis friends in thareat britain, the european countries that respect the rulaw, including in trade. jane: congressman marcy kaptur, thank you for joining me. rep. kaptur: thank you. jane: british police say a nerve agent was used to poison a former rsian spy and his ughter in the u.k. sergei and yul skripal remain critically ill. three days after being found unconscious on a park bench in salisbury. police say they were targeted and th attack is being treated as attempted murder. home affairs correspondent tom symonds reports. tom: sergei skripal was a man with a shadowy past. relatives said he feared ittc would up with him and he would be targeted.as but hesing his own name, living a normal life, popping into a corner shop last month for milk and bacon.

tonight he and his daughter remain gravely ill. this evening, britain's most senior counterterroralm officer re why. >> in summary, this is treated as a major incident involving attempted murder by administration of a nerve agent. as you know, these two people remain critically ill in hospital. sadly, in addition, a police officer who was one of the first to respond to the incident, is also in serious condition in hospital. tom: it wasn't just police officers and mandolin steams who came into contact. could they have been affected? >> my message to the public is that this event poses a low risk to the public on the events we have. tom: now the focus is on the

nearly three hours between skripalnd yulia arriving. areas remain cordoned off including the italia restaurant. an eyewitness who wanted to remain anonymous told me g appeared to be wrong. what was your view of them? >> initially i thought he had mental problems. it was out of the blue. there was no oneem around he started screaming at the top of his voice. he didn't look right. he looks like he was going to lose his cool. tom: hese and other eyewitne had dark hairipal as in this picture, but police fromseized cctv footage 4:00 p.m., a man and a blonde haed woman entering the shopping area. detectives will sort through massive eyewitness reports and cctv to establish the truth. the government was briefed on the inquiry today.

>> we need to keep a cool head and make sure we collect all the evidence we can, and we need to make sure we responded not to rumor, but all the evidence they collect. and then we will need to decide what action take. ury isut life in sali dominated by the response to the suspected poisoning. a woman was taken ill at an office at lunchtime -- this was the emergencyre service'tion for the teams in protective suits and respirators were at a nearby aniline station. someone used a chemical weapon among the sunday shoppces of this peaful cities. no one is takinchances. tom symonds, bbc news, salisbury. 'ane: let's take a quick look at some of the day's other news now. as hespoken archbishop of celebrated mass is tade a saint, according to the vatican. archbishop oscar romero denounced repression and social injustice in his country as it descended into civil war. no one was ever convicted for

his killing. coca-cola is to make an alholic drink. the 125-year-old american company says it wants to cash in on a growing trend in japan for a fizzy-flavored drink mixed with a local spirit. coca-cola says it is targeting p specift of the japanese market. and state media in china has encouraged men and women to settle for someone who is more or less ok when choosing who to marry. the appeal, made in wspaper editorial, urged people to be less fussy when comes to picking a spouse. e follows concerns about low birth rate in the country. diplomatic envoys from south korea will deliver a private message from north korean lead kim jong-un when they visit washington later this week. president trump ys pyongyang seems sincere in its willingness to discuss the possibility of denuclearization. for more, christian fraser and i spoke earlier to chris hill, former u.s. ambassador to southe on the program "beyond

100 days." is there anything different that you can see about this new overre? mr. hill: frankly, it looks like à vu all over again. what is different is kim jong-un has never said anything like this, he has never suggested his nuclear program is on bargaining table. it is something new. i think out of respect and cooperation with the south korean i think the trump administration needs to hear this throughnd see if there is something there. jane: what more could they give in order to facilitate these talks? mr. hill: from the point of view tof tmp administration? first of all, i think the trumpd nistration has harsh words, but it is important to keep the sanctions on. there is a sense that maybe the sanctions have had some role in perhanging the north koreans. i would hold off on those,be bui woulilling to work with the south koreans on possibly

getting some kind of conversation and even a negotiation going. i think it is very important that they be cautious but not be churlish about this. christian: it's interesting you talk about having a conversation, ambassador, because i'm wondering who they get to have the conversation. hee united states has lost south korean ambassador, and victor cha, who was supposed to be going, has withdrawn his nomination. who does thenited states have could engage with the north koreans? mr. hill: well, that is a very good question. qjoe jut last week, and victor cha, of course, is not going out to seoul. it is a veryood question. hope they are not picking jared kushner at this point, but certainly they have to start staffing up the state department. i think this special envoyin should bhe state department, and i hope there is a real effort, because you can't have diplomacyut diplomats, and that is precisely what this administration has been trying too.

christian: what do you make of what president trump is saying, hat it is his rhetoric th done this, the maximalist approach is taken to north korea? he might be right. maybe the north koreans have blinked, maybe the chinese h e mr. hill: he might be right, whatever. he is going to claim credit. that is fine. the south koreans are doing well to work with him and giving him t credit that if not due, it is ok, that's fine. the question is how we go forward, how we can find something new in this, if we can do something about theble situation in the korean peninsula. jane: former ambassador chris hill talking to us earlihi. you are wa "bbc world news america." still to come on tonight's program, i try my hand at an increasingly popular trend in the u.s., axe throwing just how hard can it be?

a british diver has filmed himself swimming through a sea of plastic in bi, putting new focus on how polluted our oceans really are. this area attracts thousands of tourists because of its marine life and pristine waters. richard warner, who took the video a couple of dayse ago, sp the bbc about his experience. >> we see it randomly. we see the occasionacloud of it, and it comes and goewith the current within a few hours. at was horrifying, that amount. likeobably just smelled driftwood yo would find on the beach, because the smell comes from theic organ matter that would naturally get washed out

into the sea anyway. but plastic doesn't really smell . .t is the algae when we look at the labels on the packaging, i think all the stuff i have seen has been from indonesia. but witthe indonesian current we have dominating here, im could come frther north from north and south east asia, perhaps. every single water bottle and every single glass bottle we have collectedyou just never see them -- if they are on the ground, they areot going to be on the ground for long. they should them to a planted li to be recycled. but general plastic weight, a lot of people do with it themselves. when i was growing up, we had to keep -- we had the "keep britain tidy" campaign that brainwashed us in a good way.

the people here haven't had that yet. jane: europe's migrant crisis and a state of terror attacks have exacerbated tensions surrounding muslims and fueled with the rise ofight-wing political parties in europe. the chair of islamic studies at american university has spent the last sever years traveling throughout the region to find outhy europe's historic link with islam has broken down, and what can be done to fix it. his findings are in a new book, "journey to europe," and he tjoined me studio. anambassador, you very much indeed. it is difficult to make a generalization, but how would you sum up perceptions of muslims in europe right now?al >> gen and broadly negative. it is serious enough for a lotbe of parties tiding the ntattails of this sentiment and even making brash ents and statements, talking about concentratn camps, talking

about even soap factories. this is laely in eastern europe this is happening. those interested in building bridges, as i amneed to be aware of this and present arguments and data an examples of how to build these bridges. europe has an answer. the remarkable thing we found is europe needs a pluralist identity. there is a time when europe hads a pluridentity where jews and christians and muslims could work and live and create together. thatg was a remarkable find had. in a sense it needs to rediscover its identity in terms of minorities. tene: what about america, which you have also wr extensively about? that doesn't have that historic tradition. how was the experience they are different? akbar: you are right, america doesn't, but muslims come to america in a different capacity. they have memories of the

-- many have memories of the history of slavery, but many of them, the immigrants from the midd east and south asia, th came in the 1980's and onwards. they were doctors, entrepreneurs, more middle-class. typedon't have that sa of tension inherent. 9/11 changes everything for all muslims. the studies conducted aft years of field work with the wonderful team of mine, students and scholars, presentsen recotions based on the people we talked to in the field. g we talked nd muftis and archbishops and the entire range of leadership, rabbis. imne: some of the stories you have heard from muwho come to europe are heartbreaking. how does the breakdown affect them? akbar: iaffects them very badly because they are skipping -- escaping a terrible situaon at home. they are not here willingly. there escaping violence and

maess of some of the regimes in the middle east -- you see this on your own reporting every night. syria, for example. they arrived in europe is the ultimate refug and then they are treated increasingly in such a negative and i would even saye inhuanner, that they find their caught negative and nasty alternatives. what do they do -- this is the big question that europe and its traditional humanism and humanity has to answer. jane: very briefly, you have said it is no longer enough to onsay that islam is a relif peace. what can we say? akbar: it is a failure of muslim leadership, failure to understand the younger generation. they cannot just keep repeating "islam is pee." they need to have studies, have programs, conferences, explanations of who they are and what the probl is and how can it be solved. ultimately, jane, the last words of the book in my study is the jewish saying, "heal a fractured world."

t is a fractured world and we need to to heal jane: thank you very much for joining me. now, there is a new trend quite literally trying to make itse mark in s. if you find darts or bitling a little tame, how about axe throwing? the craze started in canada and seems to be catchingre. organizers hope it could turn into a mainstream sport. of course, i couldn't resist giving it a go. you had a bad day at work, or maybe yohave fallen out with your partneri don't know. what better way to ease the tension and get rid of some of that pent-up aggression than to tob an axe at a wall? >> the normal thino is, hey, let's do something that i could end my life with today. so when it comes to this, everyone can experience something new. it is a lot of fun.ep now ith your right foot. give it a good go.

just take it up. jane: well, i hit the target. >> you did hit the target. ngit is really not that daerous as long as you don't throw it ryke a crazy person, and t to have some fun. jane: axe-throwing is becoming alarmingly popular in the u.s., having made its way across the border from canada. there is even an axe-throwing league. that is otite a medal you've g there. how did you win it? >> one is by throwing large axes at the wall. jane: what is your top tip for me? >> i go with the two-handed style overhand. no wrist action. that is a common misperception. no wrists involved in the throw. jane: how does this make you feel? >>an it makes me feel like a with a big hairy chest. jane: clearly, my technique needs a little polish.

--after half dozen throws i promised i wouldn't do bad with it -- i'm exhausted, and i still haven't hit the target. but it is great fun, and i'm so glad i had a b day at work. oh! and so the night rolls on. oh, come on! oh! once you have mastered the basics, there is no li what you can do with an axe. and then there is that golden moment when it all comes togeth. yes! jane o'brien, bbc news, axe-throwing queen of washington. oh, yes, be afraid, be very afraid. you can find much more on all the day's news on a website, and

check out facebook to see what we are doing it any time. i'm jane o'brie of-rowing queen washington. have a very good evening. >> with the bbc news app, our vertical videos are designed t work around your lifestyle, so you can swipe your way through the news of the day and stay up to date with the latest headlines you can trust. download now from selected appes stor. >> funding of this presentation is made possible by the freeman foundati and kovler foundation, pursuing solutions for america's neglected needs. ap planning a vacation esce that is relaxing, inviting, and exting is a lot easier tha you think. you can find it here in aruba. families, couples, and friends can all find their escape on the island with warm, sunny days, cooling trade winds, and the crystal bluearibbean sea.

nonstop flights are available from most major airports. more information for your vacation planning is available at aruba.com. >> "bbc world news" was presented by kcet, los angeles. ca

ioning sponsored by newshour productions, llc >> woo judy woodruff.ing, i'm on the newshour tonight, the tment of justice sues california over its immigration policy. we get reaction from two of the defendants: governor jerry brown and state attorney general xavier becerra. then, president trump plans to sign off on new tariffs on imported aluminum and steel. how the owner of a company that mas beer kegs sees the economic repercussions. also ahead, parched land and dwindling livestock-- a severe drought in somalia threatens the country's agriculture and many who rely on it. >> as far as the eye can see you would normally see camels, goats and sheep. now however it's completely desolate.